Four Hours to Kill! (1935) review

It's a exceptionally busy night at The 43rd Street Theatre, which is presenting the musical Give Me a Thrill: escaped convict Mako (Richard Barthelmess) is handcuffed to police officer Taft (Charles C. Wilson) but is desperate to wipe out former associate Anderson (Noel Madison), Mae (Dorothy Tree) is trying to swindle $200 from Eddie (Joe Morrison) who's engaged to Helen (Helen Mack), Carl (Ray Milland) is on a date with married Sylvia (Gertrude Michael), the phone booth is broken, an expensive pin goes missing, and so on.  Considering the meager running time (it's seventy minutes long) there are entirely too many characters to really delve into any of their situations - not to mention multiple egregious coincidences - but it does have a good deal of zip to it and a conveniently pat ending where everything is resolved when the stage curtain closes.  It's lucky for the paying audience that apparently not a single one of them can hear the constant gunshots ... or maybe living in NYC back in the 1930's made people immune to such a racket.